


Trials of Maturity

by ForNought



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-12
Updated: 2013-07-12
Packaged: 2017-12-19 06:28:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/880513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForNought/pseuds/ForNought
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eren is totally the best person in the world. You can ask anybody for proof, except for maybe 98% of the people he knows. This is the story of how he manages to stay awesome even though nobody listens to him, his friends think he's an asshole and his best friend is sort of dating his nemesis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trials of Maturity

If you asked Eren, he would say he was one hundred percent in the right to launch himself at Jean in a bid to use his scrappiness to reclaim Armin's mobile phone before the tall, smug-looking boy did something totally uncool. Jean was definitely the kind of person to throw it into the pond in the quad and Eren knew that and it was up to him to save the day. Except he should perhaps have accounted for variables such as Mikasa and Armin attempting to intervene in the struggle for Armin's phone. If he had thought about that he could have prevented the frighteningly long moment that followed Jean finally freeing his wrist from Eren's grip, his stupidly long limb flinging back and catching Armin in the face.

"You absolute prick!" Eren roared as he swung for Jean.

He ignored Armin's insistence that he was fine even as he had his hand clamped to his eye. He kept saying he was fine and Mikasa was even backing him up, but what did they know? Armin probably got some sort of fast-acting concussion from that hit and who knows where Mikasa's head is most of the time. The fact that his fist missed Jean was irritating, especially when the taller boy was an easy target at the time. His arms had dropped limply at his sides and his face was a mix between fear and horror and Eren felt satisfied at that. He was about to try for another punch but Mikasa's hand was on his shoulder and weighty with authority. With that, he snatched the phone from Jean's loose grip and steered his friends away from that jerk.

 

* * *

 

 

"Why did you have to do that?" Armin wailed with his head in his hands.

"There, there," Mikasa said in a flatly unsympathetic voice as she patted him on the head. With her other hand she shovelled a fistful of fries into her mouth, wary of the girl in the corner who was wearing the same uniform as them but was also staring intently at the trio. This specific McDonalds was never packed at this time of day but there was always a good quantity of students from their school there, so the girl's presence was not odd but it was certainly annoying.

"Eren!" Armin's voice had quietened to a pitiful moan at this point but Eren was holding fast against everything that was telling him he had done something wrong. He hadn't don anything wrong. At all. He was just looking out for a friend.

"Maybe Eren just wanted an excuse to hold Jean's hand," Mikasa whispered.

"Shut up."

"So you're talking now?"

"No I'm not. Shut up. You're talking."

"Yes I am but I think Armin would appreciate it if you started talking too."

"She's right. I'd like that very much."

"No you wouldn't," Eren objected. "You just think you want that because Mikasa is poisoning your mind."

"Eren! Did you even stop to actually consider what was going on before you barrelled in there and started-" Armin was at a loss for words and looked to Mikasa for guidance. She thought for a moment before providing, "started playing Billy Big Balls."

Eren snorted but instantly regretted it the moment he saw the twin expressions of disgust on his friends' faces.

"Why did you just assume something bad was happening? Why didn't you stop to take stock of the situation and think 'oh, maybe Armin is talking to one of his other friends! I will now approach them like a normal human being instead of... doing what Mikasa said. Right, Mikasa?"

The dark-haired girl was not paying attention at all and it took a few hard pokes in her ribs for her to tear her gaze away from the group of their classmates in the corner.

"Whatever Armin said is right, Eren, you should listen to him and think about what a terrible person you are." She turned back to watch the other students instantly and that piqued the boys' interest.

"What is it?" Eren grumbled. He was not satisfied with the answer swivelling round in his seat provided him with. He identified one of the girls - the girl with a mouthful of mashed up burger - as Sasha and he noted grimly how Christa and Ymir were smiling indulgently at one another, the tiny blonde one holding up a hamburger for Sasha to keep taking bites of. It was a strange sight and something about it churned Eren's stomach. It was probably the fact that Sasha had somehow lived on this planet for nearly sixteen years but had failed to learn the importance of chewing with her mouth shut.

"Seriously, that does not deserve the attention you're giving - oh fuck," Eren said as he turned back the right way. Of course the first thing he would see was Jean Fucking Kirschstein and his little posse - well perhaps short-ass Connie and overly-amiable Marco don't constitute much of a posse but whatever - coming up the stairs with their trays almost overflowing with food.

"What's wrong?" Mikasa asks, finally paying attention to the people she was here with for once - considerate.

"Nothing. Let's just leave, like, right now or something."

"But we haven't finished our food."

"Then let's have a contest to see who can finish their food the quickest. Then we'll race home and do something really fun in a place where there are no other people."

"If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were proposing something inappropriate." Eren did not even have to acknowledge the looming presence next to the table to guess who said that. Fuck. Of course Jean and his friends would have perfectly timed their gormless search for a table at the top of the stairs in time for Jean to conveniently throw a snide comment at Eren's table. Who the hell did he think he was?

"You don't know any better, though, do you?" Yeah, Eren could admit that was really pathetic but it had apparently stumped Jean. It felt good to see that horsey face wear an expression of dumb confusion. That suited him much better than the conceited smirk he was so fond of. Dick.

"Um, Hi, Jean. And Marco and Connie."

Eren almost choked on the food he had wolfed down the second he decided he, Armin and Mikasa needed to get the hell out of here. What the hell was that? Armin was unapologetic as he shyly smiled up at Jean. This was gross. What was wrong with this boy, anyway? Jean made sure to bother Armin quite frequently, and often things he said made Armin's cheeks pink and his eyes a bit too shiny and today he even stole Armin's phone, so what was with this sweet politeness. There was no way Eren was reading this wrong. He refused to believe it. He refused to believe it but he did not like the equally likely explanation that was staring him in the face from the air between his and Mikasa's faces.

Why hadn't she said anything. This was stupid.

"No," Eren said firmly.

"What?"

"No. No. Absolutely not. You," He pointed a finger right in Jean's face. "You can all go away and Armin will come home with me and Mikasa and he will never leave my sight ever again."

"Are you saying we can't be friends with Armin anymore?" Marco asked slowly.

"Yes!" Eren said utilising his fog-horn voice to the best of his ability.

"What are you playing at, Eren, are you trying to protect my chastity or something," Armin hissed incredulously.

"Yes!"

"Ha. Eren, I wouldn't worry about that. I reckon Armin's chastity will stay painfully intact where this guy's concerned, if you know what I mean," Connie laughed. He did well to recover from the hard shove that comment had earned him and Mikasa even gave him a solitary round of applause after witnessing how one hundred percent of the food he'd bought was safely on his tray.

"Heh, we should probably go and sit down before somebody takes a spill," Marco said before walking over to a free table not too far away. Connie was in his seat opposite Marco before anybody had even seen him move. Unfortunately, Jean was not so quick off the mark and was still hovering at their table like the acrid stench of dog shit that had been put into a blender with cat sick and was then eaten by an evil swamp monster that had the vomited that all up on Jean's head before exploding and covering Jean in foul-smelling swamp-monster gloop and - well, Eren forgot where he was going with this but for some reason Jean was still there.

"You can go now," Eren prompted.

Jean stood his ground and adjusted his grip on his tray off food before launching into one of the worst little speeches Eren had ever heard in his entire life. "You know that I like you, Armin, and I think you definitely feel at least one hundred and twenty-eight percent the same way for me. Like, I'm sick of being all nervous around you all the time and scared to ask you for your number and stuff. It was really brave of me to ask today though, right? I'm sorry for accidentally hitting you, and I'm going to apologise on behalf of your stupid best friend too, so I hope you'll swap numbers with me tomorrow when that idiot isn't around. I mean. If you want to that is. I guess if his opinion matters more to you than your feelings for me I could back off or something."

Well, Eren thought. That certainly was noble of him. Dickhead. He was pulling something here, surely.

"No. You shouldn't do that. That would be the complete opposite of what I want," Armin piped up.

"That's great. Or just cool, or something. Yeah. I guess I'll catch you tomorrow or something."

"No you won't."

"Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow," Armin smiled. "We can talk more then."

"That won't happen."

"Don't worry, I'll get rid of Eren for you," Mikasa said added earnestly.

"So, yeah. Tomorrow, "Jean said one last time. This was ridiculous, Eren thought. Why on earth was nobody listening to him?

 

* * *

 

P.E.

Eren was grinding his teeth.

Physical education.

Eren ground his teeth together harder, making them click and squeak.

Bertholt shuffled away from him but struggled to get far seeing as the bench was packed full of the members of their class who were on their allocated basketball team. Whatever. Watching Jean prance around the half-size basketball court like a buffoon was going to give Eren a stomach ulcer or something. On the plus side, as long as Jean was in his sights here he could not be bothering Armin.

Stupid Armin. Did he have no taste at all? Anybody in the world would be better than Jean. Why did Armin have to like the guy who hated Eren for absolutely no reason? If Eren went to his friend and demanded he choose somebody else to pin all his affection on, he wouldn't have much success without a list of prospective suitors.

"Are you gay?" Eren asked Bertholt. The huge boy shrank away and didn't say anything. He didn't not say anything either. It was very clear that his eyes were screaming for help to a point above Eren's head. Turning to see what that was about revealed Reiner, barely holding it together as he stifled unsympathetic laughter. "I'm asking for a friend."

"Right. A friend," Reiner said.

"Uh, yes. A friend. I do have those, you know."

"Of course you do."

"I'm asking for Armin. See. A friend."

"Hmm. You do drive a hard bargain. Go on then; would you go gay for Armin?"

Bertholt looked thoughtful for a moment before finally shaking his head and quietly saying "No?"

"Are you asking us or telling us?"

"No." Bertholt repeated, sounding more certain of himself.

"Well, there you have it. Shame though. I bet Armin would be a great boyfriend. He'd listen to your problems, shower you with gifts, take you on really great dates. Treat you like a real classy lady, you know. Shame about one of his friends though."

"I thought that too."

"Oi! I'm sitting right here, you know."

"We know. We're also joking but maybe not completely. Who wouldn't be aware of you sitting next to them? You're really intense you know."

"Intense?"

"Aside from being loud and annoying, you're kind of... I don't know. Do you have a boner for Kirschstein or something?"

"No. Where the hell did that come from?"

It was Bertholt who quietly said, "You've been staring at him this whole time."

Reiner laughed a loud, hearty laugh at that and a few other students turned to look over. "Haha, yeah. You're a step away from either having sex with him or beating him up."

"It's the second one, the beating him up one obviously. Idiot."

Reiner's snort sounded sceptical but Eren didn't let that bother him. He had bigger things to worry about. When it was Eren's team's turn to play he was very aware of Jean sitting on the bench and just being a general nuisance from the sidelines. It was one thing to hear him mocking Eren's inability to really reach up and get the ball from taller opponents, but hearing Jean loudly telling Marco about a date he had organised with Armin was the last straw.

He hadn't reacted quickly enough to swat the ball from his mark's hands as he went for a shot, so it was all he could do to stand under the basket and catch the ball which dropped through the basket, increasing the opposing team's score. Eren saw his chance and flung the ball over the benches and hit Jean right in the middle of his face. He wasn't even going to pretend that was an accident. It was good to see Jean struggling to stand up with his hands cupped around his face. The teacher stopped the lesson. There was a lot of exasperated sighing on their part before telling Marco to take Jean to the medical room.

"No!" Eren yelled. If Jean left the room, bloody nose or not, he could go and find Armin and maybe violate him as much as he dared to on school grounds. Jean was totally that kind of person. "I'll take him. It can be my punishment for hitting him in the face."

The teacher was humming and hawing and not really that bothered either way by the looks of it.

"I don't think that would be the best idea," Marco said. He had his arms round Jean's shoulders, ready to steer him on his way to the medical room. Marco was definitely one for mollycoddling people. He needed to learn to let go, let the little one spread his wings and fly. If Jean walked into a few doors or walls and made his injury worse it would be a lesson for him in the future.

"Let me take him."

"I don't know if I trust you to not break his knees or something when you're on your way there."

"Why would I do something like that?" Marco just laughed humourlessly and averted his eyes. That was an exaggeration of his character, Eren thought darkly. Whatever. "Fine. Just don't let him get anywhere near Armin."

"Why would he go and see Armin? Is he a doctor or something?"

"Of course not. Anyway, why wouldn't he want to go and see him?"

"Um?"

"Aha! It's because he doesn't love him. If you're that injured wouldn't you want your loved ones to know?"

"He's not on his deathbed. You threw a ball in his face."

"For fuck's sake," Jean said in a muffled shout. "Can we go now? It's one thing that my nose really hurts but my hands are so full of blood that it's starting to leak out onto my t-shirt. By all means keep having this nice little chat if you want to hear my dad's lecture on removing blood stains but I'm out. Why didn't anybody get me any tissues anyway. This is ridiculous. You're all fucking idiots, just standing around while I'm here bleeding to death. Would you even notice if I collapsed from blood loss? Probably not. You'd probably just carry on with this stupid conversation. Just get me to the nurse right now before I kick all of you twats in the face."

Marco laughed nervously before steering Jean out of the room.

"Woah, calm down, man," someone else from the class said to more nervous laughter.

 

* * *

 

Eren sighed loudly. Nobody reacted. If this was the first sigh of the day he could have forgiven his friends for ignoring him, however he was well aware of the fact he had been sighing every now and then for at least eight minutes. Even Annie had joined them but she was steadfastly ignoring Eren's lamentations as she turned a page in her book. Well, it was not so much that Annie had joined Eren, Mikasa and Armin but that they had sort of invaded the table she was sitting at for lunch.

"Alright, seeing as I know it is killing you to find out what is bothering me, I will divulge this information."

Nobody reacted to that either. He was beginning to think he was being ignored.

"Are you sure it has to be Jean?" Eren asked.

"Are you sure you don't have mental problems? Why the hell would you attack him like that?" Armin hissed.

"Come on, Mikasa, back me up here. Jean's a complete and utter arsehole, right?"

"Some people might say that but they would also say the same about you," She replied diplomatically.

"That's what you think of me?"

"I never said I was talking about me. Maybe I was talking about Annie."

"Annie?" Eren's heart was breaking. How many people thought he was as big an arse as Jean was?

"I don't not think that."

"It's not a bad thing that people think you're an awful person." Eren whipped his head round and was greeted with the sight of Sasha stuffing Mikasa's food into her mouth. When the hell did she get here and who asked her for her opinion? Eren asked just that and she shrugged and said, "Mikasa offered her food to me."

"I wouldn't call it offering. I just moved my tray a little bit to the right." Annie laughed at that but quickly stopped as though she was pretending not to be a part of this conversation. She was a part of this conversation all right, Eren thought bitterly.

"We're talking about me here. Except we're not. We're talking about Jean being a dick all the time. Let's take a poll - forget about me for a moment: who thinks Jean is a dick?"

There were a few seconds of hesitant consideration before Sasha, Annie and Mikasa all raised their hands. That was all the evidence Eren needed. Until Sasha had to ruin it by adding, "But he does have his moments of being nice."

"Oh, yeah, I've seen him being nice too," Eren said sarcastically. "Those times don't count because I bet you any money Armin was around at the time. He is clearly a giant slime who feels like he needs to act all nice and innocent to impress Armin. Like he thinks Armin is this delicate little princess who can't handle someone who acts like a massive twat all the time."

"You're right," Mikasa agreed. "We all know he's had enough practice dealing with you."

 

* * *

 

It was twenty minutes into their Maths lesson that Mikasa apologised to Eren. He suspected it might have had something to do with the fact they were doing a group activity and he was making it difficult for her but he begrudgingly accepted it. She didn't have to apologise if she really hadn't wanted to - the rest of their circle was made up by Annie, Christa and Ymir who were working with Mikasa just fine so his sulking wasn't that big of a deal. What irked Eren was Mikasa's follow-up to the apology.

"I think you should let the Jean thing go. You have friends that we don't like."

"Who? Who am I friends with that you don't like?"

"I wouldn't like to name them all, especially because I'd be making people up past the first name. You already know who I don't like but you don't see me making a big song and dance about you staying away from him."

"Because there's nothing about him to dislike!"

"Yes there is. I can't believe you'd just sit there and take that beating from him."

"It wasn't a beating, it was more like-"

"If it was anybody else in the world you would have given back twice as much. But you didn't. Because it was that idiot and that's why I don't like him."

Ymir saved Eren from failing to shoot back a snappy retort by injecting with, "Is this some sort of lovers' tiff?"

Mikasa placed a hand on Eren's shoulder and adopted a solemn expression to say, "He isn't giving our first-born son the freedom he needs."

The tall, freckly girl laughed at Mikasa's act. Eren would have laughed too but he decided not to because he predicted this was going to end with someone making fun of him.

"So, what is all this about, anyway?"

"Armin has poor taste in men, as in he's totally stupid for Jean and I am trying my hardest to protect him from making a huge mistake. Somehow, I - the good guy - have been ridiculed for my efforts and everyone is telling me I am just as much of a knobhead as he is. It felt like a personal attack when this pair and Sasha decided to tell me what they really thought about me at lunch."

"But we didn't tell you what we really thought about you," Annie said. "We were nice about it."

"That was being nice?"

"Sasha even said there was nothing wrong with being the kind of person who rubs people up the wrong way," Mikasa agreed. Eren wasn't sure how he had become friends with her if this was how she treated him. Had she never heard of being a good friend and maybe backing up the guy she lived with?

"That's wonderful," Christa said, clapping her hands together and conjuring birdsong and heavenly light to compliment her joyous expression.

"What's wonderful? You think it's wonderful that everybody hates me? You are the last person I would suspect of being so evilly cruel inside, Christa. I demand that you explain yourself right now." Eren knew that he was safe for now because Ymir was laughing, however the moment he went too far the chuckles would stop and he would find himself impaled by chair legs and stationary.

"Nobody said they hated you," Christa explained. "I just thought it was nice that Sasha feels comfortable enough around you to tell you her honest opinion. She struggles sometimes and it was a while before she even opened up to us because Ymir kept hiding potatoes in her bag."

"I thought you said you wouldn't tell people I did that."

"No, I said I wouldn't tell Sasha you did that. If anybody else here wanted to tell her that it was you they probably could."

"Is this a lovers' tiff?" Annie asked with a faint smile.

 

* * *

 

Eren did something very magnanimous that day after school. He tracked down Armin, who was conveniently waiting for him outside Eren's last classroom of the day, and told him they were to have an important talk. Armin's expression showed his sense of foreboding as he followed his friend to somewhere more private than a packed corridor.

"What is it, Eren?" Armin asked. "Not to be funny but I kind of have plans with Jean today."

"That's what I want to talk to you about." Eren sniffed. This was stupid but sort of necessary, he reminded himself as he scratched at the back of his neck. "It has been brought to my attention that I may have been unreasonable regarding your burgeoning relationship."

"I have no idea why you are talking like that but I do agree."

"Right. Whatever. So, I've been a dick. I'm not saying my opinion of your stupid boyfriend has changed but I suppose you two might sort of have my blessing."

"Are you being serious?" Armin was pinker than usual and he was smiling so wide. Eren had almost forgotten what Armin looked like when he was happy after the past few days of awkwardness. "It means a lot to me, you know, that you are accepting this."

"Wait."

Armin's smile slid right off his face. What the hell did he think Eren was going to say? He was clearly assuming the worst in this situation which was totally unfair on Eren.

"I'm not going to revoke my niceness or anything. Gosh. I just want to let you know that I don't think you should go on any dates alone with him. You have to tell me and Mikasa, and maybe like some of his friends or something, so we can keep an eye on the pair of you."

"Why?" In an instant his tone had sharpened dangerously and Eren really wondered what he could possibly have done to deserve this.

"I'm not like judging this or anything so you can do whatever, it's just I think you need to be supervised in the early stages."

"I think it's unreasonable."

"I have your best interests in mind here."

Armin looked as though he was about to say something - something mean by the expression he was wearing - but he stopped. He looked down at the ground and nodded before looking back up at Eren. "You're not going to let me win, are you?"

"No."

"I'm sorry for the past few days. I've been acting kind of like a brat to you and I was an idiot."

"Yeah."

"Eren?" Armin prompted.

"Yes?"

"Don't you think you need to apologise for something too?"

No. Eren absolutely did not think he needed to apologise for anything. He had only been doing what was right these past few days. Just because Armin didn't like it it didn't mean he was doing anything wrong. But saying sorry was the quickest way to get this over with.

"Yeah, sure, I'm sorry," Eren mumbled. "But just so you know, I reckon Jean will be much worse when it comes to this stuff so you should prepare yourself for that."

"I'm prepared."

 

* * *

 

Eren thought of himself as a good friend. How could he be anything but if he was organising the perfect date for his best friend and his stupid sort-of boyfriend? He had spent a whole evening deciding on the details, forcing Armin to cancel his plans with Jean so that they couldn't sneak off and have a secret date together. Armin made his annoyance known but Eren held to his morals as he told him this was the right thing to do.

"This Friday. Bowling. Dress nice."

Jean blinked down at Eren a few times, clearly confused by what was going on. "What?"

"I'm assuming Armin has told you the deal: I'm not letting you two go on any dates alone for a little bit."

"Yeah, he told me. So what. Are you asking me on a date now?"

"No. This is the date I have organised for you. There will be plenty of supervision so you don't do anything to him."

"I don't think I follow."

"Well I'll be there. And Mikasa. And she asked Sasha who asked Connie who went to make sure Marco will be there. My only concern is that makes an odd number so I am willing to take one for the team and not actually partake in the actual bowling."

"Is this some kind of joke?"

"Do you see me laughing?"

"If you were any good at delivering jokes you wouldn't laugh if it was one."

Touché, Eren thought. A worthy opponent indeed. Except for how Jean wasn't a worthy anything because he was a great big bag of shit.

"Yeah, well. You're so bad at jokes that... uh. You're so sad at jokes. No I mean bad at jokes-"

"I think I'll save myself from this particular burn and just say I'm coming," Jean said through a snort. He sauntered off down the corridor, laughing and calling back to Eren, "You're a fucking idiot, man."

 

* * *

 

Apparently Jean had taken Eren's warning to dress nice literally because he was wearing the best part of a suit. Fucking idiot. All signs pointed to the fact that he had come overdressed and hastily untucked his shirt and undone the top few buttons before ripping off his tie and shoving it in his pocket. That was the only explanation Eren wanted to consider because he had no clue what else could be lurking in Jean's pocket. He was glad the moron could do nothing about the blazer he was wearing. Well, it was a lot nice than their school blazers and was probably better described as a really good suit jacket. Either way, Eren was loving this. Did this guy not know what bowling was? It was like he had aimed past smart-casual and landed squarely on black tie.

That being said, Eren could probably say just as much about how tragic Armin looked. It looked as though he had let his grandfather dress him while half-asleep. Knowing Armin, that was a very real possibility, Eren thought with a groan. The chunky, woollen jumper was one thing but Eren was sure that they stopped making the material of Armin's trousers sometime in the early nineties because of it being a fire hazard. Whatever. He just wouldn't say anything about what an eyesore the pair made outside of their uniforms. He also made a note to not let anybody else say anything about Armin's questionable attire.

As the person in charge of the date, Eren took it upon himself to divide the group into its teams; Jean, Connie and Mikasa against Armin, Marco and Sasha. He thought he had done quite a good job and ignored any complaints from everybody else. He was making the rules today and his decisions would not be swayed by the will of his people.

As the bowling alley worker sorted out the lanes for the group, Mikasa sidled up to Eren and in as low a voice as the blaringly loud music allowed said, "It's no coincidence that you organised for us to come here today, is it?"

"I don't know what you mean." Eren knew exactly what she was getting at but what good would it do for him to admit something like that?

"It's _his_ shift today."

"Is it? I had no idea."

"What the fuck are you talking about? He's sitting right in front of us, sorting out our lanes." Mikasa was not wrong. Right in front of the pair was a small-framed man who was bent over the screen to input people's names for the lanes. It was a task that anyone in the group could have done themselves but Eren was always the difficult kind who requested a member of staff did this stuff for them. If it happened to be the same member of staff each time, well who knew what kind of coincidences the universe would throw at people.

"He can also hear you," the man said in a loud drawl.

"No he can't shut up. Everybody stop talking because you're all making things up."

"How is anybody making anything up? I'm sitting right in front of you and I can hear you. Those are the basic facts."

As much as it was no coincidence that Eren organised the date for now, it was also no coincidence that Mikasa had suddenly made herself scarce. She was messing around with Sasha's shoes as though the girl had not only failed to learn how to eat properly, but had also failed to learn to tie shoe laces. Actually, Eren did not think that was all too far from the truth.

"What are you doing here anyway? Are you trying to show off to me that you have friends? Because just in case you didn't know, I don't care and I still think you're kind of a loser."

"Who would I be trying to impress? You're just some guy who works in a bowling alley. I don't think you should be throwing stones from that glass house of yours."

"Are you calling me a loser? Excuse me for not having the time to care between my part-time job and writing my second dissertation."

Okay. So maybe it was undeniable that Eren was more of a loser. He was still in high school and painfully unemployed. Well, it isn't like there was anything he could do about that except maybe age really fast? But if he did that he doubted his current intelligence level would have been enough to get him into university, let alone give him the brains to write a dissertation - whatever one of those was.

"Hey, loser, which team am I putting your name under?"

"I'm not on a team."

"Are you playing a whole lane by yourself?"

"No. I'm just here to supervise and make sure those two don't get up to anything."

"My first question was going to be 'why the hell would you pay for bowling if you weren't going to bowl' but now I'm more interested in who you're cock-blocking." He genuinely looked interested as he folded his arms over the back of the hard plastic seat and looked up at Eren. It was quite dark along the strip where the alleys ran but lights in gaudy purples and blues flashed their way from time to time. Even under these fast-moving lights, even through the headache Eren was getting from the music that was too loud, Levi looked good. There was something practiced about the way he was looking up through his eyelashes at the teenager but it still made Eren feel like the coolest guy in the world - except for how he had been told several times by the man in front of him that he was anything but.

"I'm not cock-blocking anybody. Besides, are you stupid? I pointed them out, they're right over- No. No this wasn't supposed to happen. Where did they go?"

"Who?"

"One of them is small and blonde and the other one looks like a big ugly horse."

"A big ugly horse, huh? I really wish I could help you but my shift is almost over."

"No it's not. You're a liar."

"So what if I am? It's got nothing to do with you." He got up, stretching his arms towards the ceiling that he would never be able to reach in a million years. As he passed to go and do his job elsewhere, he patted Eren's shoulder and yawned. "Good luck, man."

"Levi-"

"Yeah, sure. If I see them I'll point them your way. I'm looking out for a big ugly horse, right?"

With Levi's salute fresh in his mind, Eren went in search of everybody else he had come with. He had no idea why they thought it would be a good idea to leave all of their stuff attended only by Eren who had no clue he had taken on such a responsibility. So Armin and Jean weren't the only absentees. There was still the fragile hope that they hadn't gone to bang in the boys' toilets - Eren was young and innocent himself so he really had no idea what possibly sexually charged teenagers might do when left unattended - but he was still worried. He would have thought that at least Marco and Mikasa were half-sensible but that thought had been shattered by their irresponsibility.

The first person he happened upon was Sasha.

"Oh, hi!" She called out over in a break in the lyrics of the song she was singing to. Eren was certain it was the wrong song but he said nothing as she made her way over at a snail's pace. Her arms were trembling as she carried several glasses in her hands with a couple even clamped between her arms and her body. She was clearly just being ridiculous. If she had not found Eren how on earth would she have managed to put down all the glasses? She would probably have just stood in the vicinity of the table at the end of their pair of lanes and waited for someone to rescue her from her plight. Good job Eren was so good at rescuing people from various forms of plight.

"Where is everyone? We're supposed to be bowling now."

"Well I went to go and get some drinks for everyone. I think Mikasa and Connie followed me to help but I sort of just left with the drinks. Hopefully they're paying for them now, otherwise I just stole like eight drinks."

"Eight?"

"Yeah, eight. No, that's not right. There are only seven of us and I counted as many drinks on my fingers. I think that I took someone else's drink too. Oh no! Should I take it back and apologise?"

"On any other day I would say yes but today I think you should stay here. We can't afford to lose anybody else. Look after everyone's stuff while I try to reunite us all."

"Aye, aye, captain!"

Yeah, Eren thought. He was the captain of this operation so it was up to him to find his team and get them to have a good game of bowling, resulting in Armin having the best first date ever, all courtesy of him. He could start up a date planning business and become known throughout the land as a purveyor of good times. He would need to think up a snappy name, but nothing lame like the Date Doctor. Maybe something that went along the lines of creation or birthing something. He could be the Dating Deity - or, because he was not so good at this, he could just let the press make their own name for him. That would work. It would be a brand of the people that way.

This was quite the brilliant idea he was having. He would have to write this down for later because he knew that if he forgot it he would be able to feel his future fortune of millions trickling away from him, even if he didn't quite understand why. He was contemplating a way to help himself remember when he found Mikasa, Connie and Marco having a disagreement with the man working at the bar.

It was brighter in the bar area - in fact the lighting was too harsh - and the volume of the music was lower but it still took garbled explanations from each person involved for Eren to get the gist of what had happened. Really, this was ridiculous. Because Sasha had taken the drinks before this newish employee had the chance to tot up the numbers, he and Mikasa got into a disagreement over the order. Connie had tried to back her up but to no avail seeing as he spouted a different combination of drinks each time he was asked. Marco was trying to be helpful and suggested they pool their money together to pay for a random combination of drinks but between the three of them they did not have enough money to cover the cost. Apparently Sasha had taken all the money back to the table with her along with the drinks.

This did not sound like a thing that would ever happen in real life, and it also worried Eren how this confirmed the fact that Jean and Armin were alone. As he was counting out change to pay for the drinks he could imagine Jean having his way with Armin and then ditching him because he had been after one thing all along. What an evil person they had in their midst, Eren thought with a shudder. But apparently he did not have to worry so much. The pair of stupid stupid-heads were sitting very close together and chatting with Sasha. Further investigation told Eren that the bastards had already bowled their turns.

"Where have you been?" He demanded to know.

"Bit of a personal question. Where have you been?" Jean replied.

"I'll be asking the questions here. Everyone disappeared and nobody was around to keep an eye on you two."

"Why would anybody need to keep an eye on us? You were the one practically sucking that guy's dick. What was all that about?" Armin actually giggled at that. The traitor.

"Okay, new rule: you're not allowed to talk. Armin, what's going on?"

Armin squirmed a bit before saying, "Jean wanted to show me something."

"Oh my god. He wanted to show you his dick, didn't he. My little baby Armin has seen a real life penis. I wish I could turn back the clock." Eren felt years being shaved off his life as he underwent something of a dizzy spell, all because something this terrible had happened.

"I didn't show him anything like that, you perv. Is that what you'd show him?"

"No."

"Well then."

"What did you show him then?"

Jean was very hesitant to give a reply. Oh fuck, he really did show Armin his dick, didn't he. This was awful. Everything horrible happened to Eren. Well, that was not strictly true but he was trying his hardest to protect his friend who was making it really hard by going along with some idiot who just wanted to show him his dick.

The ugliest cuddly toy Eren had ever seen pulled him right out of his thoughts. It was a hideous shade of purple with a garish yellow belly and it's eyes had not been sewn on evenly at all. Armin, the person who was holding this abomination, said, "Jean was showing me how he is like an expert at claw machines."

"Fuck off, nobody is an expert at claw machines," Eren dismissed.

"Uh, fuck off, I am."

"You're such a bad liar. You totally broke the machine to get that stupid toy. Or you got someone else to get it for you but that seems a bit too honest for you."

"Eren," Armin said sternly. Oh great, so now he was taking Jean's side. This was a slippery slope and one day Armin would wake up in bed next to stupid Jean and wonder what the name of that guy was - you know the one, he used to hang around Mikasa all the time. As conscious of that as Eren was, he could not help but consider that that day would come a lot sooner if Eren kept picking fights over nothing. He was being stupid, wasn't he?

He backed away to the alley. Marco, Connie, Sasha and Mikasa had decided to keep bowling by themselves. They had paid no heed to the names on the scoreboard as they took shots whenever they wanted. The evening was a shambles and Eren realised his dreams of becoming a professional date planner were in tatters.

"I was going to be famous," Eren lamented as he sat down on the floor. His headache was really starting to get a hold and he was losing the will to fight it. He was close to not caring anymore but he still cared a tiny little bit.

"What?" Mikasa asked. She sat next to him, so close that Eren swore he could feel her warmth through his clothes. Or perhaps he was just stressed out and sweating enough to give himself that comforting illusion.

"Oh. I was talking to myself. Why did I bother organising this? It hasn't even been fun."

"Are you done spying on Armin then?"

"I suppose so." Eren followed Mikasa's gaze back to the seats where Armin was grinning up at Jean and laughing at something. Eren doubted it was something Jean had said because what was funny about him? Except for his stupid face. The pair of them looked really happy together and just seeing that tugged at something in Eren's chest. They were just talking and the smile on Armin's face was the most brilliantly beautiful smile that had been on his face in a long time. Eren sort of wished he had had a part in putting that smile there. If he hadn't been so resistant to the whole Armin and Jean thing, he might have been able to be a supportive friend who was just happy to see his friend happy.

"I feel horrible," he finally mumbled.

"I'm not being funny, but you should."

"Thanks for that." Mikasa just smiled at Eren as though she knew that her way of cheering him up worked better than anything else. "Was I that bad?"

"Yes. You were awful. You should just leave them to it. You might not like Jean but he really likes Armin. He'll look after him."

Eren groaned and dropped his head onto his knees. He felt a light hand pat him on the top of his head. "You won't leave me and get a horrible boyfriend, will you?"

"What if I got a horrible girlfriend?"

"No, no. You're not allowed to get a horrible anything. You can't get a nice anything either. No things for anybody."

"Deal," Mikasa said, grabbing his hand and shaking it. "Oh, but you're not allowed to get any anythings either."

"Absolutely." Eren raised his head to look at the girl. "We'll vicariously experience things like that through Armin. It's too stressful and I don't want you to hate me. I don't want him to hate me either but it might end up happening anyway. You'll just have to do some extensive work repairing our relationship."

"We'll see how it goes," Mikasa nodded. Eren looked from Mikasa to Armin who had sort of melted into Jean's side. After closing his eyes, Eren nodded and agreed that they would have to see how everything went.


End file.
